What James said, plus as I've understood it, this affects everyone who plugs their digibox to their Xbox and apparently especially bad if you watch stuff with lots of panning, such as sports - something I may have seen a little bit in the Xbox One launch presentation. The whole thing was sold as this wonderful TV magical machine, and now they did a really silly fuck up with the formats.

Okay, that's a pretty darned big oversight, in that case. Hopefully something they can fix in future updates... I don't know enough about the architecture to tell if it's something they can fix through software, or if they need a console revision.

It's a brilliant little gem. Fans of point-n-click adventure games of old will find so much to love, even if the playstyle is slightly different. Also one of very, very few games that managed to make me cry.

@oldhat: Get Spelunky, too. The Vita is one of the best ways to play it, and I'm pretty sure it's cheap as hell right now.

The Vita has the best version of Lumines, so that's worth getting. Hotline Miami is pretty darned good on the little thing. As is "Thomas Was Alone". And a slew of PSP games, like 30 Second Hero and Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Ogre. And Sound Shapes. And I'd recommend picking up some PS1 games too, like Alundra and Crash Bandicoot 3. Also, Gravity Rush is one of the more unique experiences to be had.

Also get a bigger memory card. Really really get a bigger memory card.

I don't know what the solution to the PAL/NTSC thing is, but then again it's not my job to figure these things out.

My point was that there isn't a solution. You either do pull-up on the 50hz source, or pull-down on the 60hz source. OR you interpolate one of the sources up to 300hz and then cut that back down to either 60 or 50hz. Any way you go, it's going to look like shit. You'll get judder from the pull-up/down, or you get false frames that look crappy with interpolation (and potentially totally fuck up the audio sync). The biggest oversight seems to be that there isn't a clear manual option to switch between PAL and NTSC, and it doesn't switch automatically when you're in a single video source situation, but those can both be easily patched in.

Can't the games easily render at 50Hz instead of 60, though? They're creating the images on the fly so, unlike the input source, games don't have an intrinsic framerate. Although I know console games tend to program closer to the hardware than PC games, so maybe the game developers are assuming a fixed framerate.

If previous generations are an indication, rendering games at 50hz would essentially make them play at 5/6ths of their actual speed. It's a problem Europeans had to grin and bear with outside of a VERY few games that actually got PAL optimized, all the way up until the PS2/Gamecube. The GC did at least have a 60hz mode, and certain PS2 games had it as well, but then you needed a TV that could handle 60hz. Which wasn't a given back then.

As an illustration, notice how in this video the NTSC 60hz footage starts a little later than the PAL 50hz footage, yet it finishes much earlier.

So today I bought a PS Vita off of a friend of mine and quickly went to work setting it up, getting some free games from my plus account, a few that came with the PS3 version of the game I bought (only one of note was Stick it to the Man), and I had some money leftover in my PSN wallet, so I bought Spelunky.

Spelunky is...freakin' ADDICTING. And a good time killer.

EDIT TO ADD: I also downloaded the demo for EXIT PLAN and TEARAWAY. Both feature the capabilities that VITA has (touch screen, roatate, back trackpad) and both are...pretty fucking fantastic. Which is odd for me, because back with my DS Lite, I fucking HATED games that were all about the touchscreen. EXIT PLAN is all dark comedy and has a way of making me laugh while solving a puzzle. Tearaway is...just a beautiful fucking game. The demo alone brought a spot of brightness to my day. I'll most likely be buying both today because damn, I'm impressed.

Actually, here's some short thoughts on the games I have played with it:

Hotline Miami: Amazing as always, but I think I prefer playing it with mouse and keyboard. I feel like I need an additional thumb.

Gravity Rush: Beautiful game, but I will never understand this style of game. I just can't get in to it.

Spelunky: This was going for about $3 and I happened to have that in my PSN wallet. It is punishing, brutal, and freakin' ADDICTIVE AS ALL HELL. I have a feeling this game will be my "cool off for a bit" game. The levels are short (you die pretty quickly in some cases) and with the random level generation you never get bored. Highly recommended. Also, read this article on it: http://www.pcgamer.com/review/spelunky-review/

Stick It To The Man: This game actually works better as a PS VITA game rather than for my console. Nice writing, but finding the gameplay repetitive and the voices are getting to me. Aside from that, I'm kind of surprised this isn't a Double Fine game as it's got Schafer's juices all over it.

Rayman Legends: Cute. That's about all I can really say of any of the Rayman games. Cute. I can pick it up, play around for a bit, put it down, and not miss it one bit. Annoying use of the touchscreen.

Escape Plan: And speaking of use for the touchscreen, this is actually pretty brilliant, as it won me over as a game that doesn't involve my beloved controls and it pretty much strictly touchscreen, motion sensor, and back touchpad. Darkly funny and fun puzzles. I only had the demo for this, but will be buying it.

Tearaway: Another game that uses everything the Vita is capable of and it's incredibly pretty. Actually managed to brighten my day even. Incredibly, wonderfully, beautiful. I'll also be buying this game, as I feel that any bad mood I have will disappear with that game.

@twentythoughts, I ended up buying the physical copy of tearaway as well. Fucking awesome game.

Also, before I go internet dark for the holidays, I picked up Thomas Was Alone and Machinarium for the vita. I own both of these on the computers, but NEEDED them for portable gaming. Because they're fucking brilliant.